Field of the Invention
This invention relates to improvements in a forming machine for a sopes food product. More particularly, the present machine receives semi-cooked gorditas and creates a dish cavity in the gorditas using a continuous conveyor system wherein the sopes can later be filed by the end customer.
Description of Related Art Including Information Disclosed Under 37 CFR 1.97 and 1.98.
Sopes are Aztec cuisine made from corn (masa) flour cakes and are topped with a variety of items from just beans and cheese, to eggs, shredded chicken or beef, vegetables picadillo, or even just guacamole. Sopes make a great appetizer because of their small size. Making any recipes involving homemade dough can seem like an intimidating task to some, but I assure you the corn mesa flour used in these Mexican recipes is a pure joy to use. The sopes are formed from corn balls that are pressed into flattened circles. The flattened circles are then lightly cooked on both sides and then the outer edge is pinched to form a raised edge.
Several food products use a raised outer ridge to keep toppings within an inner surface. In high volume production the process needs to be performed in a rapid manner where some form of automation increases the efficiency and the rate of production. A number of machines have been made that form a raise outer surface have been issued or published. Exemplary examples of patents and or publication that try to address this/these problem(s) are identified and discussed below.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,963,402 issued on Jun. 15, 1976 for Peter Berta discloses a method for shaping shells for hors d'oevres. The method uses an upper male and a lower female dies that where a sheet of dough is placed and pressed together in a matrix that forms multiple shells at a single time. While this patent covers a machine that makes shells, the shells are made from dough and provide an even wall section without a flat lower surface. The machine requires an even sheet of dough and does not use an individual disc of pre-cooked dough.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,634,365 issued on Jan. 6, 1987 for Pedro R. Triporo et al discloses an Apparatus for Making Pizza. The apparatus uses a flat-bed conveyor where trays of pizza move around an arc where a series of vertical rods push into the pizza to texture the top surface of the pizza. While this apparatus forms the top surface of dough it does not operate in a linear conveyor where the dough is pressed in a linear rolling motion.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,074,778 issued on Dec. 24, 1991 for David E. Betts, Jr. et al discloses a Pizza Crust Dough Forming Die Assembly. The assembly accepts a round dough ball that is placed central to the forming die. The top die closes vertically onto the lower die and the dough is squeezed to fill the forming die. Because the dough is squeezed between two dies the volume of the ball of dough must be accurately maintained to ensure that the pizza is completely filled without being over filled where excess dough is squeezed out of the die.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,919,508 issued on Jul. 6, 1999 for Davis A. Donnelly et al discloses a Process for Forming Dough Foodstuffs. The process starts with a dough ball placed on an oven safe sheet. The dough is the pressed with a vertical press to form pizza crust, rolls or loaves of bread. While this process forms the uncooked dough products, it required the uncooked dough product to expand as it rises. The dough is not partially cooked and then pressed to set the base and raised outer surface.
What is needed is sopes press that operates on a conveyor belt system where the gorditas are loaded into female trays and then a male tray compresses the gorditas into a sopes. The proposed sopes dish forming machine provides the solution with a conveyor forms the sopes for resale.